How to Stop Siblings Hitting Each Other

The short answer: step between them calmly and firmly, separate them so bodies can calm down, and deal with what happened afterwards. If one child is often hurt, it is no longer ordinary rivalry.

This article begins with safety, because when children hit, safety comes before understanding. Understanding comes next, and it matters, but it never waits in front of a child who is being hurt.

The guide is in three parts: what to do in the moment, what to do afterwards, and what to watch over the following weeks.

In the moment: stop, separate, soothe

Stop it. Step between the children calmly and firmly. Your body says more than your words: “I won’t let you hit.” Short, low, clear.

Separate. Give each child a little space. Not as punishment, but so that bodies can calm down. Different rooms, or different ends of the same room.

Soothe the hurt child first. Turn your attention to the child who was hit. Check they are all right. This tells both children something important: in this house, hurting someone does not win the parent’s attention; being hurt does.

Keep the lecture for later. In the heat of the moment, nobody can hear one. One sentence is enough: “Hitting is not allowed. We’ll talk when everyone is calm.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics advises parents not to take sides in ordinary sibling disputes, and to step in when it turns violent (AAP, HealthyChildren). Hitting is the moment to step in. Hitting back, smacking the child who hit, teaches the opposite lesson: that bigger people may hurt smaller ones when they are angry. The AAP advises against spanking and harsh verbal discipline for exactly this reason (AAP, HealthyChildren).

Afterwards: understand, repair, teach

When everyone has calmed down, perhaps an hour later, perhaps the next morning, come back to it.

Ask, don’t accuse. With the child who hit, alone: “What happened just before?” Sometimes there is a clear reason: a toy taken, a feeling of unfairness, a long day with no attention. Sometimes there is none; the child was angry and the hand was there. Either way, a reason can explain a hit. It never excuses it.

A consequence, measured. The hit has a small, clear consequence: the game ends, the toy goes on the shelf, the child plays apart for a while. It ends when it has done its work. You are disciplining, not tormenting. What I want is a child who stops hitting because they do not want to upset me or hurt their sibling, out of love, not out of fear of me.

Name the feeling, hold the rule. “You were furious that she knocked over your tower. That makes sense. And hitting is still not allowed.”

Find another way together. “Next time she touches your tower, what could you do instead?” Shout for help, walk away, ask for a shelf of your own. Children remember solutions they helped to invent.

Repair, not a forced apology. Children aged four to nine tend to believe that a willing apology helps, and see forced ones as empty (Futurity, on research by Smith and colleagues). Rather than demanding “Say sorry!”, you might ask: “What could you do to help your sister feel better?” A drawing, a shared toy, a hug if both want one.

Research on parents who learned to guide sibling fights, rather than judge them, found children compromising more and understanding their sibling’s view better (Smith & Ross 2007). Guiding takes longer than judging. It also tends to work for longer.

Over the weeks: look for the pattern

One hit tells you very little. A pattern tells you a lot. Over the next weeks, notice:

• When does the hitting happen? Same hour, same room, same activity?
• Who starts it, and who is hurt? Does it change, or is it always the same child?
• What happened just before? Hunger, screens ending, a parent’s attention going elsewhere?

Often a pattern points to a change that prevents the next hit: a snack before the hard hour, a shelf that belongs to one child only, ten minutes of attention named in advance.

Check the example at home

Children copy how the adults handle anger. If the parents shout at each other, slam doors, or hit, the children will too. If comparisons are made (“why can’t you be like your brother?”), the children will turn them into fists. So the honest question is: Are we doing our role? Do the adults in this house show what it looks like to be angry without hurting anyone?

A word about the child who hits

It is easy, after a hit, to see one child as the aggressor and the other as the victim, and to keep seeing them that way. Be careful with that picture. The child who hits today may be the one who feels least seen, most crowded, or most tired. Protect the hurt child first, always. Then make sure the child who hit is also understood, because a child who feels like “the bad one” may stop trying to be anything else.

When it is not rivalry

This part matters most. Ordinary sibling fights go both ways and come and go. Some patterns are different, and should be treated differently:

• one child is always the target
• a child is afraid of a brother or sister
• the hitting causes injuries, or uses objects
• there is a big difference in age or size and the older child keeps hurting the younger
• there is any sexual behaviour between siblings that worries you

A large national study linked sibling aggression in the past year to more mental-health distress in children, and mild physical assault by a sibling was linked to more distress in children under ten than in older youth (Tucker, Finkelhor and colleagues 2013). In other words, being hit by a brother or sister is not “just kids being kids” for the child on the receiving end.

If you see any of the patterns above, protect the hurt child, supervise closely, and talk to your child’s doctor or a counsellor soon. If someone is hurt or in danger now, call your local emergency number.

This week

Keep a small record for seven days. Each time there is hitting, write one line: the time, who hit whom, and what happened in the five minutes before.

At the end of the week, read the lines together, with your partner if you have one. Look for the hour, the trigger and the direction. Choose one change that could prevent the most common version, and try it for the next week.

Hitting rarely stops because of one perfect response. It usually fades because the adults saw the pattern and changed the ground it grew in.

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Next step

Look at one real fight. Answer a few questions about tonight and see what may be behind it, what made it bigger, and a 7-day sheet. If any safety question is ticked, the tool gives no sheet; it tells you to get help first. Try Tonight’s log →

Sources

• American Academy of Pediatrics. Sibling rivalry. HealthyChildren.org
• American Academy of Pediatrics (2018). Disciplining your child. HealthyChildren.org
• Smith, J. & Ross, H. (2007). Child Development. Summary
• Futurity (2018). Forcing kids to say “I’m sorry” doesn’t fool anybody, on Smith, C. E. and colleagues, Merrill-Palmer Quarterly. futurity.org
• Tucker, C. J., Finkelhor, D. and colleagues (2013). Pediatrics. Abstract